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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25830784">The One You Didn't See Coming</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/brokenmemento/pseuds/brokenmemento'>brokenmemento</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Harlivy Week 2020 [1]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Birds of Prey (And the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn) (2020), DCU, Harley Quinn (Cartoon 2019), Harley Quinn (Comics), Poison Ivy (Comics)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Circus, Angst, Established Relationship, F/F, Falling In Love, Heart-to-Heart, Past Relationship(s), happy endings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-08-10</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-08-13</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-05 03:13:35</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>4</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>15,650</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25830784</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/brokenmemento/pseuds/brokenmemento</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>A week's collection of stories over a variety of prompts in order to celebrate #HarlivyWeek on my Discord server. All based on falling in love and gaining something a little more. Please note individual chapters for ratings as each will have its own.</p><p>//<br/>Day 5: Today’s prompt is dedicated to the Harley Quinn Show. It’s from Ivy’s point of view and where she contemplates the roads not taken. How might life be different?</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Pamela Isley &amp; Harleen Quinzel, Pamela Isley/Harleen Quinzel, Poison Ivy/Harley Quinn</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Harlivy Week 2020 [1]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1879858</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>16</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>84</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. And So We Begin</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Monday's story rating: G<br/>Prompt: Batman Animated Series<br/>Art by: random-arthoe on Tumblr. (Check out her other work!)</p><p>For the total immersive experience, listen to “Chain” by Lolo for today’s fic.</p><p>https://open.spotify.com/playlist/0VH50uXNAIZUaez0Y0IGsE?si=V0DG7BT7SrG_peWI8gOGwg</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Poison Ivy knows about paradise. It’s what she dreams of when she closes her eyes. It’s the vision she has always had for the world. </p><p>One that humanity never seems to share. </p><p>So she takes up the mantle of being the protector of the earth. She pulls away from the ones who destroy and devotes herself to the things that bear life without carnage. That’s how she winds up in the museum in the first place. </p><p>Just as she picks up the box full of toxins, she spins when she thinks she hears a noise in the next room. The motion inadvertently trips a sensor she hasn’t been watching out for. </p><p>“Oh, no,” she breathes out and breaks into a dead run. </p><p>Which is a lot harder than it looks with an armload of cargo not so easy to carry. Even harder when she runs smack dab into something dressed up in a clown outfit that reaches out and yanks her behind an exhibit to hide. </p><p>“Nice work butterfingers. Why didn’t ya just turn on the bat signal while you were at it?” a high pitched voice asks. </p><p>Well, that’s certainly the very wrong foot to start off on. </p><p>“I wasn’t trying to get caught,” Ivy says in exasperation. </p><p>“Coulda fooled me,” the voice snaps and then they’re off again after she’s shattered one of the toxins from Ivy’s stash. Literal backs up to a wall, she turns to look at Ivy. “Hey, aren’t you that plant lady, Poison Oakey?</p><p>Ivy already feels tired with this combative personality. She doesn’t like people. Their predictable unpredictability is what makes them dangerous and hard to learn. Ivy isn’t exactly keen on them, preferring to work alone the bulk of the time. </p><p>Sadly, it looks like they’re going to have to help one another out if they want to avoid getting a one-way ticket to Arkham. If only she can just maneuver them to where her getaway vehicle awaits…</p><p>“Any ideas?” Ivy finds herself letting frustration at the events that have transpired tonight. </p><p>Then the wild woman by her side is shoving a bottle of plant toxin in her gun and shooting it off to bust all of the cops. Ivy has to admit, she’s impressed. (Even if she’s broken into the place to steal precisely what just got destroyed)</p><p>Somehow, some way, they end up making it out of the doors and into the thickness of the Gotham night. She can’t believe what comes out of her mouth next, but it happens anyway. </p><p>“Get in the car.”</p><p>They’ve known each other the whole of ten minutes and are already peeling out and running from Gotham’s finest outside of the Bat. Leaving the cop cars behind feels exhilarating and she can’t help the satisfaction she gets from foiling any of the blue’s plans. </p><p>So when Harley holds up a hand awaiting a high five, Ivy answers it with a slap of her own as they speed away into the night. </p><p>“This could be the beginning of a beautiful friendship,” she tells Harley. </p><p>Such a foreign concept, a friend. But as they go further away from Gotham, she thinks one might be nice to have. Harley Quinn seems like a good person to have in her corner.</p><p>******************</p><p>Not that she would ever admit it to anyone, but having Harley around proves to be less hard to get used to than she’d thought it would be. Maybe because Harley has a way of keeping someone on their toes. </p><p>She’s sort of unrelenting in that way, but Ivy ends up finding it more endearing than annoying. It’s why she gives her the shot to protect her from herself and the toxicity of where she’s chosen to hide out: because she wants Harley to stay. </p><p>Even if she drivels on about Mistah J. At those points, Ivy would rather strangle herself with her own vines. Running around Gotham for as long as she has, she’s had a lot of time to develop a refined sense of distaste for Harley’s paramour. Which lends itself to be more perplexing that she feels the exact opposite for his girl. </p><p>Ivy offers snide comments when Harley gets particularly nostalgic about her time with him. For the most part though, she just hopes that Harley will burn herself out if she lets it go on long enough. </p><p>She also hopes for other things. That the more time that Harley stays in Toxic Acres, the less she will feel the pull of her old life. That she will be so pumped full of adrenaline from the two of them becoming the “New Queens of Crime,” she won’t miss anything that got left behind. </p><p>That maybe she was worth more than she’d ever given herself. </p><p>But the last part doesn’t happen. Much to Ivy’s disappointment, neither do the other’s really. There’s the old adage about the definition of insanity, but Ivy feels its a bit of a nonstarter to try and remind Harley of it, especially since they’ve both done stints in Arkham. </p><p><em> Maybe she’s just misunderstood, like me </em>, Ivy thinks. At one point, Harley could have responded to reason. Before, she could have diagnosed her own behavior. </p><p>But now, Ivy feels like Harley is too far inside of herself and with little way to see out. Perhaps what she needs is an outside perspective. The plan takes hold and Ivy decides its worth a shot after Harley arranges her dinner into his troubling face. </p><p>Finding the right moment to do it is another thing altogether. While she’d like to jump right in, she needs to wait out the perfect moment to bring it up. Which... doesn’t really come. Exasperated, she grabs Harley one night when she can stand it no longer. </p><p>Ivy pulls two chairs out from the kitchen table facing one another. Harley protests when Ivy grabs her hand and sits her down, moving to the chair across from her. </p><p>They’re both in their usual evening attire, long shirts, and bottom undergarments. Ivy has never been particularly modest as far as her body goes and Harley isn’t either. Where Harley’s inhibitions lie are with a certain green-haired moron. </p><p>Their knees brush together and Ivy can’t believe she’s about to flip the script on a psychologist but an intervention is needed. Mostly for Harley’s sake, sure, but Ivy can’t stomach more talk about him. He’s a tether to everything they do and it’s time to cut the cord. </p><p>“Okay, Harl. Time for you and I to have a good ole heart-to-heart,” Ivy announces. </p><p>“Oh, gee, Red. Do we have to? I’m feeling a little blue,” Harley whines. </p><p>“Precisely the reason for our talk. You can’t keep doing this to yourself. Remember when I said you needed a lesson in self-esteem? Well, now is the time and I’m the teacher.”</p><p>“What could you tell me to make me feel better where Mistah J is concerned? I can’t help but miss him! He’s my Puddin’ after all.” Harley’s face goes wistful and sort of far off.</p><p>Ivy grumbles and turns Harley back to face her with two fingers on her chin. “Focus. I want you to take a moment and really think about this. What makes you feel good about yourself?”</p><p>It should be a simple question, really, but Harley looks nonplussed. Ivy’s face goes blank. She knows what she’s about to hear. </p><p>“Well, when Puddin’ tells me I do a good job.”</p><p>“And how often has that happened?” Ivy snaps. She feels guilty when Harley’s shoulders sag. Her knees brush Ivy’s again and Ivy can feel the soft smoothness of them. She composes herself and tries again. “Do you feel confident in any of your abilities?”</p><p>“I did manage to get that diamond without tripping off any alarms! I’m pretty good at gymnastics and you and I have been doing some successful heists lately. They’ve even given us a nickname in tha papers!” Harley finally looks excited. </p><p>Ivy chooses to bypass the thinly veiled reference at her own performance at the museum when they met. “Good. See? You have many wonderful things about you. You’re agile, athletic, good in a pinch when someone needs a team-up,” Ivy ticks off on her fingers. “So why not focus on those things?”</p><p>Harley looks pensive for a few minutes and then her face folds. “Because it’s easy ta forget about those things, ya know? I’m not used to hearin’ that I’m doin' real good. Or even good at all.”</p><p>Ivy leans back in her chair and slumps. “Self-worth shouldn’t be tied to other people. Take me for example.” She points to herself and sits forward again, straightening her back and flicking her hair with a hand. “I’d been on my own for as long as I can remember before you came along. And while I do like having you around, I’ve managed to carve out my own identity. No man can hold me back.”</p><p>“But Mistah J made me! It’s hard to be me without him,” she cries back. </p><p>“He didn’t make you, Harl. You were someone else before him. You’ve just forgotten it. You need to remind yourself what healthy boundaries are,” Ivy tries for pep. <em> Or boundaries at all.  </em></p><p>“Red, you live in a toxic waste dump,” Harley frowns. “You’re not all healthy or nothin’ either.”</p><p>“There’s more than one type of healthy!” Ivy throws up a hand. She doesn’t miss Harley’s flinch. Balking, she regroups and reaches out slowly to take Harley’s hand. “Physically, touch shouldn’t hurt.” Ivy rubs a finger back and forth over Harley’s palm. The blonde sinks a little in her chair. “Emotionally, you should feel confident in yourself. Socially, you should surround yourself with people that build you up, not tear you down.”</p><p>“Listen to you and your sweet talk, Red. You sure know how to treat a girl,” Harley puts her elbows on Ivy’s legs and her chin in her palms. </p><p>She looks up with those baby blues and it’s hard for Ivy to get the straight edge to her love. What should be tough is ending up a lot less. Ivy lets her back hit the chair. She folds her arms across her chest. </p><p>“I just want you to be alright,” Ivy admits. <em> Because I do care, Harley.  </em></p><p>Harley gives her that dopey grin she’s so good at giving, leans forward, and wraps Ivy in a hug while also planting a big wet kiss on her cheek. </p><p>“Oh, alright. Enough of all that,” Ivy protests and works to shove Harley off of her. Like it’s annoyance she feels instead of something warm, like the sun, inside of her body. </p><p><em> Yeah, maybe this friend thing could be nice. </em> </p><p>
  <em> ***************** </em>
</p><p>It lasts all of about five seconds, but Ivy supposes, it was good while it lasted. The thing about Harley is that she just can’t stop being herself, so the Joker and his cronies show up to put a kink in the good thing she and Ivy have going. </p><p>And Batman gets out of the chains.</p><p>That’s another kink. At the end of the day, all three of them wind up in Arkham, him behind bars and in a straight jacket while the two of them get to at least breathe fresh air while tending to the plants outside. </p><p>Ivy thinks about offing the guards for being dense enough to give her yard time, but that’s something she would have pulled before-PH. Pre-Harley.</p><p>Loathe as Ivy is to admit it, she doesn’t want to do anything to jeopardize someone else’s fate without their explicit knowledge. She won’t add more days on to Harley’s stay by pulling a stunt that could get them both out. </p><p>But she will wait. She will wait because her act isn’t exactly solo anymore. Because it’s nice having Harley around. </p><p>And who would she be anymore without Harley? Not a New Queen of Crime without the sheer wildness that is Miss Quinn. </p><p>Arkham can’t hold them forever. The streets will be theirs once more someday. Ivy flings a shovel full of dirt in Harley’s face and can’t wait for that again. </p><p>
  
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. The Glorious Return of One Poison Ivy and the Subsequent Joy of Harley Quinn</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Prompt: The Cinematic Universe<br/>Rating: T for language<br/>Song Pairing: "Fairly Local"-Twenty One Pilots<br/>//<br/>How could Poison Ivy be introduced into the world of the cinematic universe? She shows up when Harley is just starting to figure out her life with the Birds, only to flip it upside down again.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Again, thanks to random-arthoe on Tumblr for the art for this chapter!</p><p>Also that opening for BoP where Harley says she got her heart broken and one was a RED HEADED woman? Yeah, that’s Pam Isley.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>When it really boils down to it, I was kinda spiralin’ after the whole messy breakup with Mistah J. With my Puddin’ kickin me to tha curb, I had to refocus myself, find out who I really was without him.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Luckily, I met a kick-ass group of gals that are my pals now. Sure, it was a little rough going at tha beginning, but now we have shit down. We are a team. Helena, Renee, Dinah, and Cass--we got a good thing goin now that I’ve left my shitty past behind and so have the other girls. It also doesn’t hurt that Cass swallowed and subsequently shit out a diamond that held the key to a literal fortune.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>So yeah, things were runnin’ pretty dang smooth if I do say so myself. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>I spent my days bouncin’ all over Gotham, causin’ problems for GCPD and smashin’ a few skulls. What kind of mercenary/contract killer/life coach/dog walker/bounty hunter/hit (wo)man (also former psychologist, but I’ll leave that out for now) would I be if I didn’t?</span>
</p><p>
  <span>But as tha old saying goes, all good things must come to an end. Or in my case, just get really fuckin’ complicated--as if they hadn’t been already. But I digress. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Things were goin’ real smooth when my life got blown ta hell. And for you to understand how that happened, I guess, like my last story, I better start at the beginnin.’ Before I lost my breath. Before I lost any sense of what ta do. Before I started seeing red everywhere.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>()====(</span>
  <em>
    <span>goodnight</span>
  </em>
  <span>()</span>
</p><p>
  <span>I watch as the girls pile into our favorite taco shack. It’s probably a little early for the round of margaritas but I’m in need of a little liquid pick-me-up, so I carry out the tray and pass them all around.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Why the need for the pick me up? Well, my slash business is currently experiencin’ a lull. Cass and I try real hard ta stay busy and find things to entertain ourselves, but if I don’t keep that little pickpocket focused, she tends ta go rogue and the last time that happened, I found myself buying a cart fulla laxative and shovin’ a guy off a dock with a grenade strapped ta his chest.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Renee is her usual surly self so I don’t much feel like barking up that tree. I know she’s missin bein’ a cop, even if she carries on a lot about how fuckin’ shitty it was and how they didn’t give her no respect. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Dinah and Helena always look unconvinced when she starts talkin’ like that. I kinda think sometimes she’s hintin’ a lot with me, with my previous background and all, but I haven’t been Harleen Quinzel in a hot minute, so I don’t think I’m much use to anyone like that anymore. (Which is why I marked it out on tha card. I’m bein’ practical here)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Renee grouses a few more minutes for good measure but then loses herself in the chilled drink in front of her. Each of the Birds quiet when the next tray comes and we are all shoving food down our throats. Dinah is mid chomp when her eyes go wide and she reaches into tha breast pocket of her blazer. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I almost forgot,” she holds out tha paper with one hand, still gripping a taco full of sauce and cilantro with tha other. I take it from her and unfold it. “Apparently Gotham is the best kind of shithole because everywhere I go, even the nicer places, there is some seedy stuff going on.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The scribble on the paper is a number and then a name: Elliott Grimley. Why does that sound familiar?</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“And since my business card doesn’t include the killing people part, just the singing part right now, I figured I would pass along the info,” she finishes. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>I frown. “There’s nothin’ here. Who tha fuck is this guy?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“He’s over the Wayne Botanical Gardens,” Renee fills in and we all turn to look at her. She looks flustered. “What? I was a fucking cop, remember? I’ve met everyone in this town once over. Anyway, the guy’s a real douche, that smarmy type that always manages to look good on the outside but hides shit on the inside. I’m not surprised someone has come looking to put a hit out on him.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“But he’s employed by Bruce Wayne. Shouldn’t Wayne have vetted him before employing him?” Helena asks. She’s the dark type on the outside, but pretty gooey on the inside. Sometimes I forget she shoots arrows through people’s necks. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Everyone has two sides,” I tell them, looking down at the paper again. Folding it back up, I glance at Cass. “You ready to be my hench lady?” I smile. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She flips me off. “As if. You’re mine.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>I shove a taco in her mouth and pull her cap down over her eyes. I feel my adrenaline start ta rise. We got a job.  </span>
</p><p>
  <span>********************</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Cass frowns as we sit on top of the botanical garden’s domed roof, looking down through the glass and into the overflowing shrubbery, vines, and green. She’s got her knees tucked into her chest and phone screen shinin’ brightly in the dark. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“If we get caught, I’m going ta tell them you have another diamond up your ass,” I growl. She’s so not good at surveillance. I make a note about training her better. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>When I try to slap her phone outta her hand, she yanks it back and gives me a severe look. “If you must know, I was looking up ya boi. Seems he’s on the research board. Runs all of their experiments and such. He’s also in charge of getting grants and funding for his team of scientists. A pretty big fancy pants.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She looks really smug thinkin’ she’s bested me on a stakeout when all she did was fuckin’ Google the guy. Super smooth. I roll my eyes and point down into tha gardens. “My turn. The guy is constantly at his job so you and I gotta figure out what type of shit he’s been doin’ to piss someone off bad enough to want him dead.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Is there any chance you’re going to do this delicately?” Cass flinches and I smile broadly. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Nope,” I say and bring my bat down on the glass. It cracks, a long fissure running down it until it completely shatters and falls away, raining down the ruins onto the ground below. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>I jump through the massive hole and land with a little flourish, maybe hearing </span>
  <em>
    <span>not all of us can be a gymnast, Harley </span>
  </em>
  <span>as Cass hangs through the opening and clatters unceremoniously to the ground. She manages ta do a little roll at the end of her landing which cushions her fall. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Any chance you have a map on that device of yours?” I ask, looking up and down the long hallway, unsure of where to go. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“This isn’t amateur hour,” Cass huffs and holds up her phone with a layout of tha place. She pushes past me, leading me through the building. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>We make it to their state of tha art lab, tons of scientific equipment stocking the place. Small seedlings and other green stuff I don’t even have a clue about sit across a long table in the middle of the room. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>I peck a few keys on an outdated computer and Cass frowns. “It’s 2020. Who still uses these things?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“This,” I point “is called a desktop. We used these thingy majigs way before you were even born to do work.” I say it all slow like so she knows I’m makin fun of her being a baby. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Tell me again how Arkham was a good place of employment for you,” Cass says with a face devoid of much. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>We both know what she’s referrin to. Fuckin’ teenagers. Before I can open my mouth though, we both spin when we hear a loud rumble.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The thing about Cass ‘n I is that we don’t really run away from things much anymore, instead runnin’ ta them. I grab her by her satiny jacket and yank her to where tha sound is coming from. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>It’s not too hard to figure out where tha commotion is considering that a metal door sits askew on its hinges. Both Cass and I walk up to it and I bring my bat up, ready for whatever is waitin on tha other side. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Slapping my hand onto tha light fixture, I see tha room is a complete mess, everything knocked or turned over. Whatever or whoever did this is long gone though. I’m wadin through the debris when I notice the far back wall, a human sized hole blown into it and leading outside, outta tha building. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>I get a little closer and notice what’s wrapped around the cinder block wall, what’s poked itself through and burst the barrier between this room and the resta Gotham: vine. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Lush and green, there are thick strong tendrils that curl around tha concrete. I run my finger along one, almost convince myself that it shakes like Bud or Lou do when I wind my hands in their thick fur and give them a good scratch. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>I drop my jaw in awe and take a step back as suddenly, buds appear and grow at a speed that ain’t normal. In no time, me ‘n’ Cass are starin at tha most gorgeous roses I’ve ever seen in my entire life. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What does that mean?” Cass asks but I don’t have good words for her right now. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Not when I know exactly what it means, but just can’t speak it. When I know exactly who has created beauty amongst the ruins. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>*****************</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She covers her trail for a solid week. I know Cass is gettin frustrated and if I’m honest, I’m that way too. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The whole mess with Grimley doesn’t appear to be changin’ anytime soon and if I don’t stop draggin my feet, I can almost bet that my competition lookin for that guy I’m supposed to kill will finish the job for me. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>We figured out (me and tha other Birds) that the night tha Gardens got wrecked, some computers were taken. </span>
  <em>
    <span>Laptops</span>
  </em>
  <span> for my younger business associate’s word of choice. Whatever was on them must be big because there’s no way my rival would risk their neck for anything small time. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>I’ve avoided tellin Cass too much about the ghost we’re chasin’, but she’s a smart kid and I know I’m not exactly pullin the wool over her eyes anymore. I almost started ta tell her this was the work of Mistah J but her detector for bullshit is pretty high and I’m not tha best liar, so I just haven’t brought it up. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The problem is, when Cass and I follow one of Grimley’s scientists to his apartment, we’re bustin in the door all blazin saddles but have been beaten to tha punch. Because there she is, standing in all of her glory and my scientist guy is hangin by his ankles from vines. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She turns around when Cass and I enter and I lose my damn breath. (She’s always been able ta do that, since the very beginnin’) </span>
</p><p>
  <span>When Cass goes ta open her mouth and break the trance I’m in, I shove my fingers down her face and push back, effectively getting her ta shut up. I don’t want the first thing spoken in this room to be from her. It needs ta be from me. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Red,” is what I manage ta get out, some sort of raspy whisper that sounds like my balls haven’t dropped or nothin’ yet. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She pauses mid-motion of her hand, stilling from my voice. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Even though I’m not lookin at her face just yet, I’m knocked over totally. There are leaves in her red tresses, tha strands cascading down her back in waves. What her hair doesn’t cover, I see the freckled and bare flesh of her back, her strong shoulders and arms. Greenery covers tha important bits but there’s a material or somethin that looks like bark covering her lower back and hips, her shins and knees. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Then she turns and I’m meetin the sparkling green eyes of the only woman who has managed ta break my heart in all my life: Pamela Isley. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Pam-a-lamb and mine’s origin story is another tale for another day though. One where I was still Harleen and she was just Pam and one crazy fuckin night we did some crazy fuckin and I woke up alone in sheets that still smelled of us and a heap of regret thinkin I’d done something wrong. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>But I digress again. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Red flicks her gaze over to Cass and looks utterly confused before she finally says somethin to me after all these years. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Harley.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Okay, well. That’s all she says but in one word, I’m a puddle a goo at her feet, those blessedly bare and delicate ones standing so incredibly near. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You look real good, Red,” I beam and hear Cass stage whisper </span>
  <em>
    <span>what the fuck is going on</span>
  </em>
  <span>? about the same time Pam tightens the vine around the poor guy’s neck, popping his head clean off. Blood spatters and sprays and it’s so gruesome, even I make a face. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Pam looks unaffected and glides across the room and past me without another word and I find myself dumbly following after her. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>When she sees I’m not goin ta let her go so easily after only seein her on the tv for a whole buncha years, she finally gives me more than my name. “I’d ask why you’re hanging out with a pubescent teenager but I know it’s probably some off-the-wall, Harley-fucking-Quinn kind of thing.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>I don’t even glance back at Cass. “Oh, her? Yeah, well, she’s sort of my ward. I’ve takin’ her under my wing.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“And there it is,” Pam sing songs, continuing to make her way out of the building. Not even nonplussed that she just killed a guy or nothin.’</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Which I guess brings me back to my other story I deviated from. Since I last saw Pam, she’s gotten quite tha reputation, calling herself Poison Ivy. Which is formidable and all, but I remember her as anything but venomous. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>That night, I was just Harleen Quinzel, a lady plagued by terrible visions at night and fallin a little too hard for a guy from the wrong side of the tracks. To me, she was Pamela Isley, a brilliantly beautiful biochemist new to Gotham. She bought me a drink, I kissed her at the end of the evening, and she took me home when the darkness fell. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Little did I know, I’d just missed her at Arkham. While my heart was fallin and breakin for Mistah J all at once, I let her invite me into her bed one lonely night. With her hands, I let her try to erase what was buildin in me and when she lay against me after it all, I might have cried because I never wanted ta let her go. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>I’ve wondered how much my life would differ if she’d been at Arkham when I got there. What coulda happened if I’d been her psychiatrist instead of his. Had she been able to pick up on the fact that he’d already latched his claws in me by the time that she took me against her? Could she smell him on me as she lay against my skin?</span>
</p><p>
  <span>I shake my head to dislodge the very sexy but also very heartache-y thoughts. “So what are you doing here, Pam? Are you workin on something that involves Grimley?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She spins on me then, ambling closer than is wholly necessary. I know Cass thinks I’ve lost my damn mind but I sorta fold in on myself and look sheepish, even though Pam’s face isn’t severe. It’s a better reaction than droppin my shorts on the ground like I’d like. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What are </span>
  <em>
    <span>you</span>
  </em>
  <span> doing here is a better question,” she murmurs. Maybe looks at my lips. Okay, that shoulda had a question mark because I’m pretty sure I just want Pam lookin at them. (</span>
  <em>
    <span>Thinkin about them, tastin’ them, all the things</span>
  </em>
  <span>)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>I brighten even more. “Oh, someone put out a hit on him and we were just trying to figure out why before we did him in.” I smile and drag a hand across my throat. Pam watches the gesture with amusement. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Mmm, you always have been good at reinventing yourself. So many people you’ve been since we met. I must say, this one is a lot healthier than some of the others,” Pam hooks a finger under my chin and brings our eyes level. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What about Grimley?” I mutter like a robot because Pam’s touchin’ me! It’s like bein watered after a drought and in the spirit of truth, a whole lot is wet right now. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She leans in and kisses my...cheek. My eyes flutter shut and when I open them again, she’s using a vine to carry her up to the rooftop of an adjacent building.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“See you soon, sweet pea,” she calls out as I watch her float away. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>My bat makes a clanking sound on the ground and I jump when Cass walks up beside me. I completely forgot she was even with me.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“She just totally killed a guy,” Cass points back to the apartment. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yeah,” I say dreamily and lean on my bat. I’m already thinkin’ about when I can see her again. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>*******************</span>
</p><p>
  <span>I take a page from my ward, dropping from the fire escape to the ground as Cass snores away upstairs. She’s supposed to be the angsty teenager sneaking out at night, but here I am breaking into a run and ducking around a corner, looking up at my place to make sure she ain’t following me.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Some part of me should feel guilty, I know, but ever since I saw Pam, I have wanted to fly solo again. I don’t want Cass getting mixed up in all of this because I know whatever my original girl is planning is batshit bonkers. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>I find her at her old stompin grounds. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>It’s just after midnight and she’s managed to change the look of the place into a jungle wonderland. The Ph.D. part of my brain knows it’s not rational ta be jealous of plants but she’s always liked them more than people. I guess I’m just worried she won’t like the me she discovers if she gets ta know me well. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>When I walk in, I’m immediately enveloped by vines and carried by them across the space between us. She lets them hover me over her as she looks up from her lounged posture on a body-sized leaf. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“We go years without seeing one another and the second I’m back in Gotham, I can’t seem to get rid of you,” she tells me with a quirk of her eyebrow. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’m real sorry, Red. I just…” I just what? There’s a lot of ways ta finish that. I opt for tha truth. “Whatever you’ve got planned, I wanna be your sidekick. I want to help you. I don’t think I could bear it if you got hurt.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The leaf she’s on brings her upright and we’re starin into each other’s eyes again. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What if I hired you to take out Grimley so I could see you again? You know this town isn’t exactly big, at least not enough to lose oneself completely in. Your name does get thrown around a lot these days,” Pam’s voice is low and she’s looking at me with some delicious intent. (I think anyway)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You didn’t,” I sigh. “Hire me, I mean. But I wish ya did and not one of his asshole employees who wants him dead for overworkin’ em.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Her face glazes. “I need you to listen very carefully, Harley. Grimley is the asshole in this scenario. He had that meatsack I killed steal some of my research from when I was doing grant work with a man named Jason Woodrue. No one was supposed to see it, ever. But it’s out and I can’t help but think Woodrue had something to do with it being given to the wrong people at one point.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“So why aren’t we chasin’ him? If he’s the one that let your research out, we can cut off the players to the very top.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Jason Woodrue is already dead,” her voice is stone and I don’t press it. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What was the work you did and why are they wanting it?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“It’s to create more like me, to birth an entirely new race of people: part plant and part human. It’s genetics at its very foundation and could alter all of life as we know it. Life spans would be changed, DNA mutated. The order of life would be rearranged.” She looks into my eyes with her next words. “And no one is worth any of that. Humanity is decay. Humanity leaves the world to fester instead of nursing it to health. They’re killing the earth.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Is that why you left me that night?” I blurt out. Because of course, that’s just as important as nature dyin’ and whatnot. “Because I’m just one of those meat sacks that doesn’t deserve ta live?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>By this point, tears are forming in my eyes and I let out a string of curses for being so weak. I run the back of my hand across my eyes to wipe them away. The world is blurry now and that’s a shame because Pam’s face is just a smear.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>I almost can’t bear to hear what she might say, so I let my watery voice continue on. “This is dangerous, the whole thing. Whatever you’re planning, don’t do it alone. Let me in on this.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>When she steps into me, Pam is pure jasmine. My eyes flicker against the scent of her. “One wild night, I might have let you stop me,” she admits. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“If this is bigger than us, I can bring the girls!” I’m bargaining now, even though I don’t really want anyone else involved. But I’ll do anything ta keep her around, ta keep her breathing. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Do you know why I left while you were sleeping that night we spent together?” Pam asks and her tone sounds melancholic, empathetic already with what she’s about to say. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>I don’t know. I don’t know if I </span>
  <em>
    <span>want</span>
  </em>
  <span> to know. Somehow, it seems easier ta beat myself up over it than hear the truth. My mind has always been good at fillin holes and that’s what I’ve done for years. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>I shake my head. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Seven years ago, I saw the most beautiful human I’d ever seen,” Pam begins. “She had this gorgeous long blonde hair that I just wanted to run my fingers through. And these crystal blue eyes behind a black set of frames that sparkled when I looked into them. And then she let me order her a drink at the bar, looking so downtrodden, and I knew I wanted to do nothing more than make her feel better.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Pam’s touching me now, her wonderful hand on my hip after brushing aside one of her vines. She lets a thumb trail across my cheek, wiping away a stray tear. “I took her home that night. I learned her skin and her sound. But I realized I couldn’t learn her heart because there was something dark growing there. Something even I couldn’t weed out.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She’s talkin about Mistah J. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Red, I woke up alone and lost and sinking further inside of myself. I’m not sayin you could have saved me. But I think I wanted you to,” I admit. “I keep thinking of who I could have been if I’d let myself fall completely for you right then instead of continuing on to Arkham.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Pam smiles, beautiful and radiant. “I’ve watched you this entire time. Like I said, you’re kind of loud.” She quirks an eyebrow, her lips. “I’ve watched the woman you’ve become. The one you were with him, the one you’ve evolved into after. I think that had I stayed with you that morning, I would have caused you not to grow in the way you have. You’ve flourished, sweet pea. I’ve fallen for you over and over again while watching what you’ve done.” She looks at me intensely, pure anguish to her features now. “How can I be in love with you when I haven’t been near you in years?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>I shoot out a hand and grab her, yanking her roughly to me, crashing my lips to hers. It’s like yesterday and forever ago against my mouth, electric after many dragging days of missing out. I’m in heaven, if such a place exists, because Pam has been the dream I’ve been chasing ever since I ceased to be Harleen. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>I don’t know how long I kiss her for, how long she kisses me. I lose all sense of time, like I always do whenever she’s around. When our lips part, she whispers a begrudging </span>
  <em>
    <span>okay</span>
  </em>
  <span>. I know what it means. It’s tenuous, but right now, for this? We are a team.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>When I stalk through the door of my place, trying to enter quietly, Cass sits on the couch with a glare. She knows she’s been left out. “Do you love her?” Cass asks.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>I feel like I’ve been hit with my mallet in my own chest.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yeah, kid,” I sigh. “I think I always have.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Because the truth is too big to keep inside anymore.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>********************</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Grimley lays at our feet dead, Pam’s research tucked underneath her arm. A pool of blood is forming on the ground beneath him and droplets plop sporadically from the edge of my bat. I’d gotten in a few good whacks before Pam finished off the job with a vine, impaling the guy in the heart.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>We both stand a few more seconds and then Pam turns around without a word and starts walking away. She’s like that though after a kill, I’m learning. Quiet steel resolve takes over her, almost like she’s disconnecting from what she’s done to justify it to herself.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>This time I don’t follow, unsure of myself since the job is technically done. I’d snapped a picture of the dead guy on the ground and sent it to the number on the paper Dinah gave me, along with a routing number to my bank account which is looking pretty thin at the moment. Hopefully, some serious cash will be filling it soon. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>As much as I need it, I can’t find it in myself to care. I’ve gotten to see my Red again but now she’s walking away and I don’t know if enough has happened for me to assume that she and I can be a more frequent thing now.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You coming?” she actually stops and asks me, curiousness lining her words.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>I make my way over to her, grateful she’s not leaving me behind. “What happens now?” It’s a good question to ask but one with loaded meaning. </span>
  <em>
    <span>What happens with this job? What happens to you? What happens to us?</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>“I don’t know how long I can keep this research out of the wrong hands. Realistically speaking, I know I should destroy it. But I worked so long on it. Poured my blood, sweat, and tears into it. If I…” Pam trails off. Her eyes do the same. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Pam, how long will you live?” I ask. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She turns to me, a line creasing her features and between the eyes. Confusion. “What? Why?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“It’s just...you said this research could alter DNA, change life spans. That research you’re holdin? It’s about you, isn’t it? It’s what that Woodrue guy did to you, but you helped create it before he turned around and used it on you.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Her face goes dark. We’ve never discussed this, mostly because there’s never been time. Once, she was Pamela with me and then next, she was Poison Ivy. There’s not been any in between. For all intents and purposes, I’m not supposed to know about her past. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>I know she feels like I’ve overstepped a line by goin all rogue and findin her origin story. But if this tremulous thing that’s sort of flaring up between us is ever going to work, I’ve gotta know everything. Just like she already does about me. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I won’t,” she sighs and brings a green hand to her forehead. She rubs a little and turns to me. “Die, that is. If I can be smart and avoid any run-ins with humanity that could possibly end my life, I’ll live forever.” She comes to me now, rests her palms against me while one of her vines holds the laptop. She runs a finger down the curve of my cheek, stopping at the Rotten tattoo, hovering there. She flicks her gaze up to my eyes. “The world won’t hold out forever. Especially not if humanity does too.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Then end it,” I whisper. I grab her face with both of my hands and kiss her soundly. In no life will I ever get over her kissing me back. “All of it exists right here anyway, doesn’t it?” I back away and tap her temple. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She gives me a small smile but then sobers. Her lips are back on mine and she’s kissing me furiously. I’m dimly aware of a cracking sound, a crunching break of plastic and metal. She’s let her vines impale the computer and it clatters for the ground. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>No one’s meant to live forever but if someone can, I am glad it’s Pam. Everyone else? Well, they can go fuck themselves. Me included. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>**********************</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The gals are all starin at each other real tense. It’s like a standoff but in this case, they’re all trying to figure one another out. I gently lay my hand on the top of Pam’s thigh under the plastic of the booth, feeling her fingers tighten on the lip of the bench below. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“As I was explain’ to the ladies,” I say calmly. “You and I go way back. So now that you’re back in town, it would only be sensible to let you join our little crew.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Pam’s words had been very stark before we came to the Bird’s regular meet-up joint: </span>
  <em>
    <span>I don’t do crews! I don’t do hero work! I do you, that’s it!</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>I may or may not have giggled at the last part. Because if it’s not clear by this point, that’s totally happening now too. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>A little shiver runs up and down me at the thought and I let out a squeak. The table turns to look at me. “Anyway, me an’ the ladies would like to invite you to be an official member of the Birds!” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>I look over at Renee who’s face holds none of my excitement. Helena is as stoic as ever. Dinah however offers a small smirk and lays the item she’s been hangin onto during my little speech, waitin until just the right second. When she lays it on the table, Pam’s eyes narrow. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What’s this?” she says quietly. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>I press a little closer to her in the booth, lay my head on her shoulder for a second, and then move my hand from her thigh to lace with her fingers. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“It’s yours, Red. If you want it. We’ve all got one,” I say and use my free hand not holding Pam to unfold the garment on the table. “I got a new red and black number I’m trying out. Dinah there is going to be sporting some serious black leather with yellow accents. Also some crazy fishnets depending on her mood. Helena tends to lean more toward an iridescent piece that works real well with her crossbow. Renee will always look like some version of a watered down cop and Cass is sort of feeling out her own look at the moment.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The material is lightweight, breathable. Pam should have no trouble moving around in it at all. I can just imagine what she will look like in it, all curve-hugging black and the swirling splatter of green leafy material winding from breast to thigh. </span>
  <em>
    <span>Her very best parts</span>
  </em>
  <span>, I hum to myself.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Harley, are you sure about this?” she turns to me, still holding the suit between her fingers. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’m sure about you,” I lean over and kiss her in front of everyone. I don’t care what they think, only that I have her near me. </span>
  <em>
    <span>Wanting</span>
  </em>
  <span> to be near me. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Okay,” she breathes against my lips. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>I squeal loudly and wrap my arms around her neck, kissin her all over her head and cheeks. I can tell she’s trying hard not to grin. To not show she might actually be kinda happy. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>In this moment, I’m unbearably full of joy. It’s a damn rare feeling. One I could get used ta having.</span>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>My girl is a part of the group now, </span>
  </em>
  <span>I think happily. Stupidly, overwhelmingly so. </span>
  <em>
    <span>Pam’s a Bird.</span>
  </em>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>
    <span>
      
    </span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>
      
    </span>
  </em>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. Take My Hand If You See Me Falling (The Tale of Isley and Harleen)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Begins where Sejic’s Harleen/Ivy ends after Ivy busts out of Arkham in the first chapter of "Black+White+Red," the digital Harley comic being released every Friday currently.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Prompt: The Comics<br/>Rating: T for suggestive material<br/>Song Pairing: "Body"-SYML</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>Arkham...Arkham has taken a lot of things from me. My career, my dignity, the last vestiges of my sanity. It took Harleen from me. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>But Arkham is duplicitous too. It does not take only—it gives: no quiet place inside of my own head. Nowhere to run away. No way to kill the monsters. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Another thing it gave me? My ability to kill. The way I could split reality into and tell myself that what I was doing would matter after I did it. The receiving of high pitched cackling in my ears as I watched the life drain out of a man I spoke my good mornings to every day. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>But even before I got twisted up in those long and mangy hallways, there had been dreams. Of staring down at the barrel of a gun one night when I could do nothing to save myself. Vivid, lifelike, terrible dreams that I loved and loathed every night. Because for as much as they frightened me, they also made me feel alive. I carried them around all day and then I took them home. Eventually, it was like I stopped waking up. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>I had always thought he needed me to drag him out of the darkness, that to show him my smile would be saving him from a life of despair. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>But he laid his claws into me and poked until I bled. He whispered in my ear and told me to take the bad out of my life with a bullet in a chamber. So like a fool, I’d taken it and walked away like a wraith.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Somewhere on the trek, the tears were flowing out of my eyes so heavily, I couldn’t see anymore. I’d removed my cowl, thrown it to the ground. I’d tried to stare into her eyes while I pointed a gun at her face.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She was right. Before I’d even arrived, I knew I’d never pull the trigger. I wasn’t there to kill her. I never was.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Looking at her sweeping red hair, the leaves that clung to it, I realized that I needed her to show me that the shadows didn’t have to be something to fear. I’d needed her to save me by putting me under. Instead, she’d let me fall and then reached out a hand with tenderness and roses.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Because, oddly, Arkham gave me Ivy as well.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>While he gave me the red of blood, of ache, of chaos and disarray, she’s given me a crimson that ties to heart, that is of blood too but the type that connects instead of spills. She’s defined what I’ve only heard others speak of, never having it for myself. This red of ours—I’ll admit it is love. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>I love her because if I stay quiet inside of my own head long enough, I can remember that she was kind, observant. Even when I was lost inside of myself, she grabbed a small string, a tether when she saw me drifting away. Stuffed it inside of her pocket and watched me carefully. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>My love for her is beyond that of mere desire, even though I am composed of that too. She is breathtaking in that kind of way, the one that makes others want to be near her, to exist some place by her side. But I love her mostly for giving me a sense of peace in a time of pure anguish. When I was a shell of myself. When I had turned into a monster of that world. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Now, she stands by the window in the faint light of the city, barely any help at all from the moon. I approach her with bare feet, my outfit still scratchy from where I’ve been, where she’s managed to pull me from. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>I know she senses me but she doesn’t turn around, keeping her eyes cast out over the city. The one I know she doesn’t feel like she belongs in. The one I don’t feel like I do either. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Her hair falls in cascades down her shoulders and as I inch closer, I can still catch the lingering scent of the flowers she grew for me as the strength of the surrounding vines shattered the wall. She gave me beauty in a bleak world. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>I touch her bare shoulder, press the pad of my fingertip into the flesh of her body that isn’t covered with leaves that fuse like a second skin. Tracing a slow line from her neck to her arm, I draw the contour of it as I go. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>There is no way she heard my desperate mumblings for her while I was inside of that place. Voices die inside of those walls and so very often, hope along with them. Yet here I stand, able to feel her underneath my hands. I let myself roll around inside the idea of her being able to hear me just like she does the bushes and trees and vines—in tune with the things that matter most in the world to her. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>We’ve grown into this over the years, a once unsteady thing that changed with each passing day. Her holding me as I let tears fall on the ground, my head in her lap with a gun worth nothing nearby and an intent worth everything inside of my warped mind. The fortifying of  me for the impending battle, making me stronger than I ever could have imagined—a way to fight the demon that had created me. Her bringing her lips to mine which would deposit poison to anyone else but me because of a vial of her magic and wonder. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The countless ways she’s saved me time and time again are what make me in awe of her. To be considered toxic and yet be the most stable thing I’ve known in all of my life. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She does not ask me to smile. She knows the very cadence of my heart and never uses it against me. The scars that line my body are a roadmap of the last few years I’ve lived, what I’ve done to myself by proxy. She’s touched them on end and never said a word. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Tonight, I’m the me that </span>
  <em>
    <span>she’s</span>
  </em>
  <span> created, the reworking, the person I’ve let myself become because her warm eyes have held me safely. I tell her this through the descent of my sketching fingers as I go past flesh to green to skin again, slowly working my fingers between hers. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>I step closer, pressing my body nearer to hopefully experience even a sliver of her warmth. Oh, how my life had been so cold until I knew her.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Her hair smells floral, beyond what I can even begin to pinpoint, and I run my nose through the waves and down the middle of her back. I lose my sight against the pressing olfactory overload, our palms still pressed together with one hand as I reach up to curl a strand of her locks gently around my fingertip.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It’s hard not to want her in every conceivable way. What I have to offer pales in comparison to what she gives me. I should avoid this because I’ve been inside a similar footprint before. Of descending into a person the world has all but given up on.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>But what if I’d followed her green eyes a little more instead of the green in his hair? What if I had listened to her truths instead of his lies? Might I have saved myself the endless heartache from him and who I’ve become? Would I still be a Harleen she could possibly love too instead of a Harley that isn’t exactly worth it anymore?</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Harls,” she breathes. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Another version of myself, but the one she believes me to be. And god help me, I like it. I can be her Harls. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Finally, she turns and I am face to face again with my version of a hero. She may not wear a cape or even be on the right side of the light most of the time, but she’s infinitely better than anyone who walks across this city in the name of goodness because she’s </span>
  <em>
    <span>mine</span>
  </em>
  <span>. She’s my cape that keeps me from falling forever, my  beacon of light, the only goodness I’ve ever felt. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Red,” I speak, both a color and name. “Ivy,” I add because I see her truly. To me, she’s the best part of humanity remaining even if she feels less than connected to that part of herself. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“We have to stop doing this,” she whispers and I’d let my heart sink into oblivion if her hand hadn’t found the peeking expanse of skin my top has left visible from mismatched buttons. She glances up into my eyes. “Me saving you from Arkham.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>A quirk of her lips, nothing more. A fleeting thing but something that warms me to my core. “It’s not the same without you.” </span>
  <em>
    <span>So far beyond bearable.</span>
  </em>
  <span> I grow bold. “No place is,” I say.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>There’s a low noise in her throat, but she says nothing, picking up my arm with her free hand. Her thumb runs over the hashlike marks on the surface of my forearm, her face clouded. I know she wishes she could erase them all with the sweep of her finger. She never speaks it though. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Stop getting thrown in there,” she warns lowly. It’s not a threat. It’s a request born of much difficulty to speak. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Give me a reason to,” I challenge. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Because how long have I been waiting for her to take me? Take my brokenness and make it bearable. Take my heart and hold it gently. Take my body and devour it whole. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Around us, I hear the foliage shake, the reflection of their master’s emotions echoing into their bodies. I cannot hear them but imagine what they’re murmuring all the same. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Why do you do this to me?” she steps forward and presses our foreheads together. We eat the same air. “Why do you constantly remind me of the piece of myself that is still a person when I’ve done everything in my power to forget?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>This isn’t the first time we’ve been like this, on a precipice looking down. We’ve always been a fracture in glass, ready to break into together. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Because if you’re no longer human, then I lose you forever,” I tell her with a simplicity I do not feel. “In no lifetime could I ever bear that.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It seems improbable that we’ve stared this down many times and in many different ways, yet have failed to capitalize on it. I’ve never wanted her to feel as if I were leaning into her so heavily because she never gave up that original piece of me she took. I’ve never wanted her to think I’ve been trying to take it back from her so I can walk down another path and leave her behind. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She catches my line of sight veering off to the side, to the back. To the refuge of her bed that has always lain in wait, has always haunted me with another way to learn her. </span>
  <em>
    <span>Oh</span>
  </em>
  <span>, how I’ve wanted her so. To show her exactly what she means to me. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Before I can get too far into the motion, she’s gripping my face between her thumb and forefinger. The same ones that make buds bloom. The ones that I know could take me apart if I uttered it so. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“There is a time and a place for us,” she says softly, curving her hands to undo the buttons on my outfit of shame. They’re nimble as they part the fabric and push it from my shoulders. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Gripping the elastic waistband to my pants, she eases them down my hips until they join the discarded shirt on the floor. Soon, I stand before her pale and bare. She looks at me as if the stars hang in my honor. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“It isn’t tonight.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Even after I hear this, there’s no part of me that feels despair. I reach out to her plant-covered hip and she lets the leaves fall away, the action of autumn but what’s left behind is pure spring. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Her hand joins mine again, a sensation I will never tire of. The other one motions as tendrils unfurl and sweep until the sheets of the bed are turned back and she’s led me to its edge. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Inside of it, there will be no panted beginnings of our bodies learning the delicate tenderness that happens on climbs and falls. When I turn onto my side and she envelopes me, nothing separating us from one another completely, I can’t find it in myself to care. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She’s in every sense and in my life and as she holds me in a type of way that only she’s been able to do, I know that we will get there eventually. We are a stretched band of rubber. One day we will fray and break. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Under ambient lights and as creeping shadows fall over our bodies, my breathing shallows with her arms around me. I close my eyes and dream of our time, our place. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>It’s a life of endless sun, of growth and green. Of the red fire staying lit between our lonely hearts. I can’t wait to get there someday.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>
    
  </span>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0004"><h2>4. Like Stepping Into a Fairy Tale Under a Curtain of Stars</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>A late 1800s circus AU involving Pamela Isley and Harleen Quinzel</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Prompt: Alternate Universe<br/>Rating: Light M?<br/>Musical Pairing: "Carousel" by Melanie Martinez<br/>Art: random-arthoe on Tumblr</p><p>Also, what Ivy does is called "aerial dancing" and it wasn't around until the 20th century. But then again, this is an AU, so I used it to fit my narrative. Haha.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <em>
    <span>April 1874</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>He kicks her to the curb on a Wednesday, the day just starting but with stars still in the sky. The doors get locked almost immediately. She only has the clothes on her back, not even a penny to her name. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She wanders the streets of Gotham the rest of the dawning hours, aimless, lost inside of herself, replaying his cruel words and seeing his sneering face. </span>
  <em>
    <span>Harley-girl, in this world, a woman is meant to be two things: a wife and a mother and you’re made of material for neither of those. If I’m being honest, those things don’t particularly interest me but I’ve got a reputation to uphold, and you? You aren’t part of that picture. Sorry, dear. You understand, don’t you? </span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>But she hadn’t. She hadn’t understood why she couldn’t hold his interest. Why she had had to give everything up while he just kept on taking. Why he could find sanctuary between other women’s thighs but she had to remain loyal. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Now though, she was free. But alone.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>After walking for hours, she’s tired, dejected, beaten down. If life is supposed to begin again, this is a terrible jumping-off point. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>A sound shatters her trance, the nearby whistle of a train. She turns on the park bench to see the boxcars being offloaded in the distance, a dazzling array of oddities and curiosities coming from inside of them: cages and boxes and tarps and the biggest wooden poles she has ever seen in her life. She can just imagine the majestic trees they used to be. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Pulled to the commotion, she slowly makes her way to the scene. Chaos is everywhere. A few tents have been thrown up at a staggering speed and she weaves through the working bodies to one that she watches a man in a top hat disappear into. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Opening the flap, she enters timidly. The tent is filled with artifacts and whatnots that sit in open trunks and on tables. A large rack of costumes in every type of fabric is off to the side, a large wooden chest of props and other items by it. Her eyes sparkle and her mouth hangs open looking at it all. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Can I help you?” a gruff voice asks, reminding her of her true purpose. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Um, yes. I was wondering if you needed any help setting up or maybe, I don’t know, with your show in general?” she asks sheepishly. She needs a job, employment, something to where she doesn’t end up in the dark streets of Gotham. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The man (she assumes the ringmaster) looks her up and down. “You don’t look like the type a person who fits in with this kinda place,” he muses. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I can be whoever you need me to be,” she responds quickly, eagerly. “I just...I need to do something. Anything.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The desperation creeps in. She hears it. She knows he does too. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>He takes off the top hat and throws it into a zebra printed chair. She watches him run a hand through his close-cropped hair. “I guess we could try you at something small. Cleaning and feeding the animals, maybe work your way up to the clown show. You think you can do clown work?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She has no idea, but she sure will try. She finds herself nodding. He does a tight one too.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Alright then. Any other special skills I should know about?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I know a little bit of gymnastics,” she finds herself blurting. All self-taught. All out of the prying eyes of her former keeper. She looks at her feet, missing the man’s grin spreading across his face. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Oh, how wrong I was. I think you’ll fit in quite nicely.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>****************</span>
</p><p>
  <span>While the big top is erected and the other various tents and oddities are arranged, she’s given the task of feeding the carnivores that are ravenous after the train ride. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She totes a large bucket of raw meat toward the lion and tiger cages, throwing in their allotted share. Her last stop becomes her favorite: a smaller enclosure with the two African hyenas stalking the straw thrown on the bottom of it. They’re friendly and despite thinking they would chew her arm off at the first chance, they’re fairly domesticated, instead reminding her of large puppies instead of the predators they are. Or should be.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>They’re both males and she names one Bud and the other Lou. She tells none of the other workers, choosing instead to live inside a nice dream where the two animals belong to her. Scratching them behind the ears, she takes the empty bucket back to where it belongs and wonders what to do for the rest of the day.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She hasn’t been given many other duties outside of the animals, so she takes to walking around the scene that is beginning to look like a bonafide event that Gothamites will want to bring their families to. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>As she stands inside of the main tent watching the trapeze apparatus being finalized, a swirl of color catches her eye off to the side. A flowing sheer silk robe trails behind fire red hair and she finds herself instantly drawn to it. Before she can think better of what she is doing, her feet are following after the retreating form.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>There’s a small space at the back of the tent with a vanity, makeup lining the surface and various perfumes and brushes. In front of the mirror is the most awe-inducing creature she has ever seen. The green eyes look up from the task they are working on, staring into the glass of the mirror to her pale body that’s come to stand behind the beautiful woman.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You must be new because a) no one has that look on their face after a long time around here and b) most people know to leave me alone,” the woman speaks, her voice as silky as her robe and as sweet as honey. It practically drips, a direct contrast to her words. Finally, she turns around and all breathing leaves the space. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She’s even more gorgeous from the front. It’s very hard to ignore the delicate slopes and curves of her body, the way the green bodysuit hugs every part of her ample bosom and flat stomach. The muscles in her arms ripple as she moves a strand of hair behind her ear and she flexes the ones in her legs as she stands and makes her way closer.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“And who might you be, little daffodil?” she purrs. Levels her smoky eyes to stare into blue.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Harleen Quinzel,” she answers thickly, her tongue not exactly working in her mouth. </span>
  <em>
    <span>What is happening to me?</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>“Not exactly a stage name. You might have to work on it,” the woman frowns. “That is if you plan to do more than just feed animals all day.” Her eyebrow quirks. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Harleen startles. Wait, how does she know that? “Oh, no! I’ve got some trainin’ for the trapeze and maybe some clown work here and there. But I do like the hyenas.” She stops her own rambling to look at the woman. “What about you? What’s your job in alla this?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>A smile pulls at her red painted lips. She holds up a finger and shrugs off her silk robe, leaving her in the very tight-fitting lace corset. She winds the robe around her hands making a rope. Stepping forward, she wraps it around Harley’s forearm and threads it through her hand. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>That breathing thing is hard again, especially with the woman so close. Harleen never takes her eyes off her movements, her smooth skin and deft fingers. “Imagine using this to hoist your body in the air, wrapping it around you, bending and contorting in such a way that it looks as if you were floating on air with only these to keep you from freefall.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Harleen lets out a small squeak as the woman tightens it around her wrist. “I...that’s...impressive.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“It’s called aerial dancing. Much like your soon to be trapeze, my fabrics are hung from the rafters and I use them to perform,” she says lowly. “I’m working on a few additions to my routine, changing up my outfit a bit since we’re in the big city now. Only the best for Gotham. Maybe you’d like to help me choose? I could use another woman’s perspective.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Harleen’s throat has closed up. The thought of spending more time with this woman, of being near her for more than scant minutes, has her skin feeling hot. Flushed. She can only nod. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Miss Isley, where ya want your trunks?” a worker calls out. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The woman turns and points. When she swivels her eyes back to Harley, she smiles. It feels genuine, not at all like the seductive act she’d begun with. “I’m Pamela. It’s very nice to meet you, Harleen.” She takes her robe from Harley’s hand, putting it back on and gliding away. </span>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>Pamela</span>
  </em>
  <span>. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The name becomes a record on her mind, the needle scratching over it to have the sound repeated on end. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>*****************</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’m trying!” Harleen exclaims, exasperation curling her words. Her hands are raw, blisters forming on them. Every muscle in her body aches, a layer of sawdust sticking to the sweat on her skin. She’s tired and bruised. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I thought you said you were an acrobat!” Mr. Tetch yells from outside of the main ring. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“One on the ground, not up in the air! This is gonna be a steep learning curve,” Harley admits. She watches him remove his top hat and toss it sideways. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Take a break, get some water. But when you come back, you better be soaring through the air like a damn bird!” he stalks off. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Harley falls to the bleachers by the ring, feeling the deep throbbing pain everywhere. She buries her fingers in her hair, bends over and rests her elbows on her knees. Somewhere between feeling sorry for herself and questioning her life choices, the scent of jasmine hits her nose and she jerks her head up to see Pamela sitting beside her, no more clothed than the last time she saw her. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Do you own clothing or do you just choose to forgo it?” Harleen huffs out. A rogue tendril curls low, flicks at not so dormant parts of her. It’s the last type of feeling she needs right now. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Who would cover up something like this?” she brushes her hands up her body and flips them out with a flourish. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Oh, to have even an ounce of your confidence,” Harleen sighs and leans back to lay on the bleacher. She peers at Pamela over her bent knees. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Well, I don’t know why you don’t,” Pamela shrugs. She points to the trapeze bar. “You have to have incredible control of your body to be able to do that. You must know it intimately.” And is Harleen imagining it or does her voice drop lower? Suddenly, having her knees in the air doesn’t seem like such a good idea. “How to bend it, to contort it in a way that dazzles the audience, that pushes your physicality to its absolute limit.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Harley sits up suddenly. “Right, so. I’ve got a few minutes before I crash land on my face again. You said something about new costumes?” Not that talking about Pamela scantily clad is any better, but it’s a step up from imagining how the woman is able to do any form of bending with her body. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Pamela stands and extends out a hand, pulling the blonde up and leading her to her tent. It’s immaculate, beautiful. Something that looks like it belongs in a downtown Manhattan flat space and not a tent in a field in the seedier part of Gotham. Harleen follows her to a trunk and an ornate dressing screen.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“So what exactly are we going for here? What type of aesthetic are you looking for?” Harleen asks, being annoyingly nosy by walking around and running her finger over everything, touching it. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I want men to adore me and women wanting to be me,” Pamela says from behind the screen. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Harleen scoffs. “I think you’ve got that down then.” She picks up a long feather off of a table, brushes it across her face. Pamela pokes her head out from around the screen.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Then just enough cleavage and leg to be sexy and not scandalous,” Pamela shoots her a look. She disappears again. “The last thing I need is to be compared to a common street whore.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She walks out in another lace number, the corset tight on her chest and abdomen. The tops of her breasts spill over the top of the garment. Harleen licks her lips, lets her eyes trace down. The bodice extends down to Pamela’s shapely hips which hold a small piece (scrap really) of lacy fabric covering her lower half.  Straps connected to the bodice hold up the white stockings covering her long legs. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“So?” Pamela motions up and down. She spins. “What do you think?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Harley can’t imagine her anywhere in this other than a bedroom. A rather vivid image of taking it off comes to mind and Harleen has to clear her throat. “Maybe something a little more conservative.” It physically hurts to say, and Harleen is pretty well aware of bodily pain at the moment. A different one is developing too and she’s not sure how much of this she can handle either. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She comes out again in a deep emerald number, similar to the one she had been wearing earlier but with more intricate detailing. It wraps around her neck and covers all of the important bits while being cut high on her legs and hips. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Green is your color, Red,” Harleen sighs out. “You look amazing.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Pamela tilts her head. “Red?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Harleen blanches. Oh, hell. That wasn’t supposed to slip out. She stands and fidgets, motioning to her own head. “Yeah, your hair. It’s...red.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Right, Pamela smirks. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Harley perks. “I think I heard Mistah Tetch screamin’ for me. I better get back to the bars,” she offers lamely. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Your accent. It comes and goes,” Pamela ignores her, taking a step closer to really study Harleen’s face. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’m a transplant in Gotham. Brooklyn is what ya hear sneakin’ into my speech sometimes.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“We were just in New York last week. Funny. I didn’t meet anyone like you,” she divulges. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>They’re inches apart now. Too close for comfort. Too close for any good to happen. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“If I’m gonna get any better, I ought ta get going,” Harley murmurs. But not before Pamela lightly touches her arm. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“See you later, sweet pea.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Once she’s out of sight, Harleen breaks into a run. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>********************</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Her first performance is two days later. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Up until then, she avoids any more run-ins with Pamela, at least alone. They still see one another but it’s become too dangerous to go back to the woman’s tent, to invite her to hers. While lovely, Pamela is a distraction and Harley needs to perfect her routine. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Butterflies swarm her stomach as she stands on the outlying part of the ring, waiting for her introduction. She’s in her performance clothing and rolling her shoulders. Quickly, she picks up some chalk to coat her hands. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“And now, the Soaring Swan, the Flying Pheasant, the graceful grandeur of the one, the only, Harley Quinn!” booms out over the sea of people. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She freezes. Wait, what? Is he meaning...her? </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“That’s you, doll. Your new stage name. Go out there and show em who you are,” the animal handler Oswald tells her. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>When she gets it together enough to exit the curtain, the crowd erupts into cheers and she does a flourish before wrapping her legs around the bar and signaling for the sandbags to drop once more.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She’s lifted into the air and begins her routine, dangling and hanging off of the bar by hands and arms and legs. At one point, she even stands atop it and jumps forward, thankfully connecting with the awaiting bar to the </span>
  <em>
    <span>oohs</span>
  </em>
  <span> and </span>
  <em>
    <span>ahhs</span>
  </em>
  <span> of the crowd. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>For the first time in a long time, she feels free. She feels new. The second she walked out of the flap backstage to be in the limelight, Harleen ceased to exist and Harley was born. For that reason, she puts on a show. She makes sure that Tetch knows she is good, that he has hired a star instead of a bust. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>When she hits the ground and waves to the crowd, the uproarious cacophony music to her ears, she takes a dramatic bow and lets the lightness in her heart travel throughout her entire body. Glancing over to the side of the ring, she almost thinks she sees a retreating smear of green. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The smile gets wider on her face. It feels like she’s surrounded by clouds. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>******************</span>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>August 1874 </span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>It’s a while before Harley can catch Pamela’s act, what with juggling (no pun intended) three duties and all. Between the animal feedings, (which she keeps for personal reasons, not because she has to) the trapeze act, and filling in for most of the clown acts, she is always smearing on white face paint and donning her jester costume when Pamela hits the ring. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Thankfully, Mr. Tetch hires another person to take her place which gives her her first night off from the clown shenanigans in months. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>After she exits when her act is done, she returns a few handshakes and receives some pats on the back for another stellar performance, weaving her way back around the big top to walk out between two sections of high rise seating.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The lights are down low in the crowd so no one pays her any mind as she stands between them. The bright glow of the spotlight shines on the ring, awaiting Pamela to begin her act. Harley squints all around to see where she might lie in wait but only sees the dual strands of thick fabric hanging from the rafters of the tent. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Harley jumps when a suspenseful burst of music erupts in the air and Pamela falls from the top of the silken strip, tumbling until she grabs hold with astonishing strength and winds the material around her legs and arms. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Her back is arched toward the ceiling, head bent down. How she’s managing to get as much agility out of the suit she and Harley had chosen is also surprising. The corset didn’t look like it had much give to it, but then again, Harley had shifty eyes most of the time Pamela was trying it on. Anything to avoid looking at the wonderful curves of her body—things Harley should have </span>
  <em>
    <span>not</span>
  </em>
  <span> been noticing. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>But now she’s free to look, encouraged even because a whole slew of others are doing the exact same thing she is: admiring the way Pamela can move and bend her lithe body, like the silken chords she dangles from speak to her, follow her will. Like they’re vines wrapping around her form to keep her cradled safely. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Harley’s act is all about daring, about jaw-dropping stunts. This is an entirely different tone altogether. The way Pamela manipulates the silk under her limbs, around and between them, is like watching water flow. Even the music has bent to become soft and sensual, to mirror every movement she makes. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>When the audience begins clapping, Harley is shattered out of her tunnel-like vision. It hadn’t even been an option, to look away. Now she watches raptly as Pamela zeroes in on where she stands, their eyes connecting. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Harley watches as Pamela spins down to the ground, bowing precisely and controlled before gracefully making her way out of the ring. Harley is turning quickly on a heel to go back between the seats and into the recesses of the tent. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She’s making her way to where Pamela should have exited but stops short when she doesn’t see her anywhere after a quick scan of the backstage area. A yelp escapes her when fingers roughly wrap around her bicep and drag her out of sight, her body being pushed flush against another in a tiny covered alcove created by the backstage area. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Pamela is everywhere then and Harley has to regulate the way her body is craving air. The area is faintly lit but just enough to where Harley can make out Pamela’s face. What it holds makes her stutter breathe. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’ve watched you for months, the way you’ve put yourself through so much to be so…” Pamela’s voice trails off. She eventually finds the words. “Mesmerizing. From that very first time I watched you until now, I’ve seen you grow and flourish in a place like this where not much ever has the chance to do so.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She runs her hand across Harley’s cheek, causing her to gasp. “Red...Pam…”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Just as Pamela dips to capture Harley’s lips, panic spikes, and Harley, stupidly, finds herself pulling away. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’m...I like men, Red,” pours out of Harley’s mouth but it feels strange now. Sounds as strange too, like she’s trying to convince herself of it as well. “Don’t you?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>It’s an addendum, a tacked on thing that doesn’t hold much weight. Not when she sees the way Pamela’s face softens and how gently she lays a hand to Harley’s cheek. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“All of this,” Pamela motions to the clothes, the makeup on her face. “It’s all an act. Out there, I’m the seductress, the femme fatale. But behind closed doors, it isn’t men I’m inviting into my bed.” Her face goes pensive, sad. “It’s why I’ve kept people away. Why I haven’t gotten close to them. But I’ve always been like this. It’s nothing new.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Harley’s heart breaks. She hates the melancholy twisting this beautiful woman's features, feels herself torn between what she’s always thought she was and who she feels the need to become more and more. </span>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>You don’t feel the way you do, Harley, without something being a little queer. </span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>“Say the word and I won’t take this one step further. But sweet pea—I’ve fallen for you over and over again,” Pamela says softly. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>When Harley kisses her, there are fireworks. She’s never once been with a woman, has never imagined it other than a passing glance here or there but with Pamela, it all feels right. Like she should have been kissing them all along. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>When they part, Pamela leads Harley back to her room, the cheers of the crowd growing distant as they move farther away. Inside of her space, Pamela leans in again and they kiss slowly, not rushing. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Her hands are on Harley’s lower back, pressing lightly in. Harley finds hers lacing in the falling curls not pinned up on Pamela’s head. On a particular sensual glide of their lips, Harley accidentally tugs while trying to stifle a moan. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’m so sorry,” she apologizes, unwinding her fingers from the red of Pamela’s tresses. “I just..I don’t know what to do. And I want to be good, you know? I want to do okay.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Oh, Harley. We don’t have to do anything at all. Not if you’re uncomfortable,” Pamela says sincerely, running her nose along Harley’s cheek. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Harley takes time to think about what they’re headed toward, how she can even begin to give Pamela an ounce of what she’s feeling at a staggering level. Summoning all the courage she has, she leans in and whispers in Pamela’s ear.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“While I go and freshen up a little, I want you to get ready and then lie down on the bed for me. When I come out, I’m going to take you in my arms and make love to you slowly, gently,” her own breath hitches along with Pamela’s the more she speaks. “And I want you to show me everything I’ve been missing every second we haven’t been together.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Closing her eyes, she kisses Pamela deeply again. This time, there’s the ever so faint fluttering caress of Pamela’s tongue against her own and it’s almost enough to make her begin the second she feels it. With great difficulty, she pulls away and disappears behind the dressing screen.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Nearby is a basin with water and she picks up the cloth there, gingerly dipping it and running it over her neck and shoulders quickly. After much debate, she decides to remove her clothing herself. There will be other times for the frantic stripping of it. Tonight, Harley doesn’t want anything distracting her from Pamela’s body or vice versa.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Harley unpins her hair, releasing it from the updo. It tumbles down and sits around her shoulders wildly. Her chest heaves as she looks in the tall body length mirror, her skin looking pale and smooth. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She feels decent inside of her own skin, but also aware of her flaws too. Several scars from childhood, a few from a dark point in her past. Her breasts are on the smaller side, but her stomach is toned as are her arms and legs. Sighing, she ends the appraisal of herself and makes her way back into the room. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Harley gasps. Perched on top of the bed is Pamela in all of her naked glory. She leans back against the bed, breasts full and round against her body, nipples rosy and peaked. Her torso is chiseled to perfection, her hips jutting, and Harley’s mouth waters from wanting to trace it with her lips. Between her thighs and flowing over them is a strip of deep green silk, looking a lot like what she uses for her show. </span>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>She’s going to use that. We’re going to use that together</span>
  </em>
  <span>, Harley’s heart starts to stammer in her chest. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>While she’d like nothing more than to barrel in, she takes tentative steps to the edge of the bed. When she reaches it, she looks down at Pamela’s stark beauty. The woman turns her gaze up with a look of reverence etching her features. When she touches Harley’s bare hip, Harley folds up inside of herself and lays her body down on top of Pamela’s.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She places a hand beside Pamela’s head on a plush feathered pillow. The other brushes against the silk fabric at the redhead’s hip, skimming her fingers over flesh and bone and fabric. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Becoming bolder with each lust-filled gaze she receives, Harley places a knee between Pamela’s legs and pushes back a little, moving her hands to the flat of the bed by the woman’s hips. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Can I touch you?” Harley manages to form the words to speak. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Are you sure you don’t want me to take the lead?” Pamela asks, not to embarrass or poke. It’s filled with genuine concern for Harley’s wellbeing, to tamp the nervous down to a level Harley can stand. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’ll admit to being a bit anxious but if you’ll be patient with me, I’d like to take the time to learn? If that’s okay with you,” Harley finds herself saying. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Pamela melts, runs soothing fingers down the prickling gooseflesh of Harley’s arm. They make their way back up to hold Harley’s neck and pull her down for a blissful kiss. “Take your time. You can do anything you want.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>With the permission open and free, Harley has trouble figuring out where to start. She settles for latching her mouth on the cords of Pamela’s neck, running her tongue along the skin. With her hands, she does her own tracing. One follows the indents of Pamela’s ribs while the other holds her own weight up. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She lets her hands eventually meet where her mouth is, both convening at the valley between Pamela’s breasts and then on them. Harley takes her time here, learns from touch and sound what the woman likes, what she enjoys. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>As her mouth works against Pamela’s chest, her hand develops a mind of its own. It moves from its stalled state on her hips to touch mid-thigh. Dipping under the fabric, fingers slowly pull it away to reveal a small shock of hair that mirrors the stunning locks on Pamela’s head.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She looks up into Pamela’s jade eyes, asking again even though the permission had probably been blanket. After a tight nod, Harley touches her for the first time. It’s warm and wet and silky underneath her fingers as they dance lightly, and Harley’s eyes snap shut as if she were the one being touched. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Pamela adds sound to the room once Harley has begun to explore more in earnest. Harley backs her up to the edge, but then Pamela’s hand shoots down to still the one between her legs. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Not yet, Harley. Please, just...kiss me.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Harley moves back up Pamela’s body, rests her leg where her hand used to be. She presses their chests together as they come together again. Every nerve ending is electric, every touch fire. It’s the best, the most, the greatest it’s ever been. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>In the midst of the push and pull of their mouths, Harley feels Pamela move below, a desperate roll of her hips until she glides once across the bare flesh of Harley’s strong thigh. The slick that is deposited there, the sheer sheen of it, makes a gulp clog Harley’s throat. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Pamela is panting by now. “I’m sorry. I said…” she works to catch her breath. “I agreed to take it slow.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Do that again,” Harley looks down at the apex of the woman’s legs, her own wedged between. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Harley, it’s…”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Whatever she was going to say gets eaten as Harley presses more tightly against her. “Pam, move. Please, move.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>And she does. She alternates between a gliding roll and another move that makes her abs flex wonderfully. Harley watches it all in awe, feels every rotation of the siren’s body in a piercing sharpness down in her own belly. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The keening cry Pamela makes when her orgasm latches on, when it doesn’t let go, almost sends Harley spiraling too. By some sheer dumb luck, she manages to keep her composure while Pamela works her way back to coherency. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You were so beautiful, so incredible,” Harley pants, her own body practically screaming for any part of what Pamela has gotten to have. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She’s gently flipped, Pamela hovering over her like the goddess she is. “It’s okay, sweet pea. I’ve got you now,” she closes her eyes and begins. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Harley stretches, becomes full. Everything practically bursts at the seams. When her strangled whimper hits the room, the muffled fanfare of their world still close by reminds them of where they really are. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Harley pretends the raucous noise is for her, for Pamela’s coming to rest not only on her body but also in her heart. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>*******************</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The performance is long over, yet the bubble of them is not destroyed from popping. Harley is grateful for small miracles such as this, but also reminds herself of what Pamela has had to endure in order to have something even resembling this kind of quiet. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Do you regret it?” Harley breaks the silence, but she can’t meet Pamela’s eyes. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What?” she asks with a furrow. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Harley buries her face into the pillow, muffling her next words. “Falling for me. The trouble I’ve surely caused you already. Will continue to cause you if this doesn’t end.” She motions between their bodies. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Do you want it to end?” It’s quiet and tremulous. It’s afraid to meet its answer. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“No, of course not. I just...I worry about what the world will think of us. What you feel,” Harley grabs Pamela’s hand. “What I realize I feel. The world isn’t exactly kind.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Pamela scoots closer, kisses the bareness of arm and shoulder. Like a worm, she inches forward with minute movements. Eventually, she makes it to Harley’s face to grab hold of blue eyes with green. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Or if you will, thrusting me beneath your clothing, where I may feel the throbs of your heart or rest upon your hip. Carry me when you go forth over land or sea; for this merely touching you is the best and thus touching you would I silently sleep and be carried eternally,” Pamela recites in a lulling cadence that would make Harley’s eyes droop if there weren’t tears forming. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“That’s beautiful,” Harley stammers. “Who…?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Pamela rests her head on the pillow Harley is using too, moves a strand of blonde off of her cheek. “Walt Whitman, from his acclaimed </span>
  <em>
    <span>Leaves of Grass.</span>
  </em>
  <span> What I am, what you may be—that’s for us to live inside. We choose what we share with the world. Whitman was no stranger to what you and I potentially face and as he writes, as long as I have you to hold on to, my dreams will be peace unending.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You’re a damn softie, but I love you for it,” Harley teases but then sobers after she feels Pamela go stiff at the words. “I think I do, you know. Love you. It’s not exactly as polished and as wonderful as yours is since you’ve had longer to perfect it but...I have no other explanation for what I feel. I love you in what I’m learning is an apparently hard to articulate kind of way.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Pamela laughs, deep and throaty. The tension leaves her body and she snuggles in closer. “Alright, that was pretty cheesy too, but I’ll give you a pass since you are kind of new to this being with a woman thing.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“We’re going to be okay?” Harley bites her lip. She’s scared of what the future holds. Of how the world might come to break them down. Of the fight they’ll inevitably have to put up to prove what they have is worth it.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Baby, we’re together. How could it not be?” Pamela smiles and kisses her again. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Harley goes deeper, blissfully falling past the point of no return. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>***************</span>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>September 1875</span>
  </em>
  
</p><p>
  <span>She’s used to them by now: the lights, the people, the cries. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She’s shed her old skin in front of them, stepped out as someone wholly new. Standing in the middle of the ring now, she knows who she is. Has become who she’s always wanted to be. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Banners boast her name, 8-foot tall and sprawling pictures of her forever immortalized in paint, words like </span>
  <em>
    <span>Brooklyn Beauty Soars!</span>
  </em>
  <span> running the expanse of it. And always, wonderfully beside her own? Pamela’s. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Even on her banner, Pam’s a sight to behold, body twisted and dangling from fabric that descends from the sky. Harley still loves to stand in front of the art when it first gets erected in a new place. She knows everyone will be struck by it as much as she remains to be, a year after seeing it for the first time. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She’d say she was born for this, to live inside the limelight. She used to think the utmost contentment she could feel were those seconds of freefall, of flying careless from on high. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>But Harley has learned there is someplace even better to be, someplace where she feels more alive. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>No matter how many shows they perform, how many towns or cities they visit, Gotham still remains the dearest. It’s where everything began. It’s why, when Harley takes her final bow to the crowd, she can always expect to see Pamela standing with a smile and miles of love on her face between the parted bleachers. Every single time. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She is who Harley seeks refuge and sanctuary in. Who she’s made a home out of deep inside of her heart.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>
    
  </span>
</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Thank you to everyone who takes the time to hit the kudos button or leave a review!</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
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